Having used a whole bunch of different TODO systems I have found there is only one that actually works.
1. Have a huge whiteboard on your wall so you can't not look at it
2. Write down all your tasks for the day
3. Estimate how many pomodoros each task will take
4. Cross off every task as it's done
This seems to work mostly because it's impossible to hide the TODO. It's not an app you close, it's not a website that gets buried in tabs, it's not a notebook you flip to a different page.
It's just simply always there. Judging you. Encouraging you.
Plus it's really really satisfying when you get to cross off an item and even moreso when you get to see the whole whiteboard crossed off at the end of the day.
LazyMeter is automating this, minus the pomodoros. It builds your daily to-do list automatically from reminders. And the focus is on the satisfaction of getting things done - not only crossing things off, but also watching the results add up. We put a lot of work into creating an app that's quick, simple and rewarding to make this a system accessible to anyone within minutes. We think it's about time we move away from post-it notes and whiteboards for tasks.
I might give it a try, it genuinely sounds awesome.
My problem is just that if my todo isn't Right Up In My Face (tm) I forget about it.
That is to say, I need triggers. If your app can provide those (like sending me a notification every time it notices I'm moving around the room to get tea or whatever) that would be bloody epic.
I've been fantasizing for months (if not years) about a wall-sized display that I could sync with my digital todo list. I don't care if it's monochrome, if it takes 5 seconds to refresh, or has pixels you can see from across the room. It just needs to be big and legible. Anyone have any clever ideas for building such a display?
I have a big (four feet long) scrolling LED ticker that I got at an industrial surplus place for maybe $75. It's controlled over a serial port and it can display two lines of text. Currently I use it as basically a decoration in my apartment - it shows some news headlines and some stock quotes. I hadn't thought about using it as a to-do list display but that might just work - although on the other hand because it can only display two lines, the necessary constant refresh or animation might get distracting.
Perhaps more usefully, projectors and reasonably big TVs are cheap these days and getting cheaper.
I've thought about buying a cheap Android tablet and mounting it on my wall for the same purpose. It'll probably be 5-8" display, but it'll have touch screen.
It'd be easy enough to write my own TODO app and just have the tablet display that webpage with auto-refresh and have big text and buttons like 'complete' or 'snooze' a task.
I've also been developing my own sensor network around the apartment, so it'd be nice to display that. No more needing to look at the small master display or check webpage on computer.
A colleague at my previous job hacked a digital photo frame to display his calendar. It had about a 6 inch display as I recall. I don't remember if it had a touchscreen but it did have next/previous buttons which was good enough for the task.
At my workplace we have a large LCD TV (about 60 inches?) mounted on the wall at IT. It uses Perl/CGI to query the support database and display a list of active support tickets and who they are assigned to, in large, bold font. Great motivation.
A projector? I have some LED sign displays as another commentor suggests, although they are a bit big, power hungry and bright to leave on 24/7 for reminders.
Yeah, I've been dreaming about too for some time. It's one of my motivations to learn information design - in hope that one day I'll put a big dashboard on the wall that will update TODOs and graph data I want to track and get feedback on (like my spendings).
It doesn't work. I have a 2m x 1m whiteboard in my room that sometimes gets littered with reminders about stuff. I've quickly learned to ignore it completely. I often end up rewriting those reminders closer together in a corner, when I need to free up some whiteboard space to do self-brainstorming or design something.
Even a whiteboard can be ignored. In fact, anything can be ignored if you're lazy. This tool seems to at least do something different such as watching your progress add up, but at the end of the day it's really up to you to do the task :)
Comments
Having used a whole bunch of different TODO systems I have found there is only one that actually works.
1. Have a huge whiteboard on your wall so you can't not look at it
2. Write down all your tasks for the day
3. Estimate how many pomodoros each task will take
4. Cross off every task as it's done
This seems to work mostly because it's impossible to hide the TODO. It's not an app you close, it's not a website that gets buried in tabs, it's not a notebook you flip to a different page.
It's just simply always there. Judging you. Encouraging you.
Plus it's really really satisfying when you get to cross off an item and even moreso when you get to see the whole whiteboard crossed off at the end of the day.
LazyMeter is automating this, minus the pomodoros. It builds your daily to-do list automatically from reminders. And the focus is on the satisfaction of getting things done - not only crossing things off, but also watching the results add up. We put a lot of work into creating an app that's quick, simple and rewarding to make this a system accessible to anyone within minutes. We think it's about time we move away from post-it notes and whiteboards for tasks.
Still easy to hire or ignore.
I might give it a try, it genuinely sounds awesome.
My problem is just that if my todo isn't Right Up In My Face (tm) I forget about it.
That is to say, I need triggers. If your app can provide those (like sending me a notification every time it notices I'm moving around the room to get tea or whatever) that would be bloody epic.
Very good feedback. More access points are on the way, but perhaps there's even more we can do here.
I've been fantasizing for months (if not years) about a wall-sized display that I could sync with my digital todo list. I don't care if it's monochrome, if it takes 5 seconds to refresh, or has pixels you can see from across the room. It just needs to be big and legible. Anyone have any clever ideas for building such a display?
I have a big (four feet long) scrolling LED ticker that I got at an industrial surplus place for maybe $75. It's controlled over a serial port and it can display two lines of text. Currently I use it as basically a decoration in my apartment - it shows some news headlines and some stock quotes. I hadn't thought about using it as a to-do list display but that might just work - although on the other hand because it can only display two lines, the necessary constant refresh or animation might get distracting.
Perhaps more usefully, projectors and reasonably big TVs are cheap these days and getting cheaper.
I've thought about buying a cheap Android tablet and mounting it on my wall for the same purpose. It'll probably be 5-8" display, but it'll have touch screen.
It'd be easy enough to write my own TODO app and just have the tablet display that webpage with auto-refresh and have big text and buttons like 'complete' or 'snooze' a task.
I've also been developing my own sensor network around the apartment, so it'd be nice to display that. No more needing to look at the small master display or check webpage on computer.
A colleague at my previous job hacked a digital photo frame to display his calendar. It had about a 6 inch display as I recall. I don't remember if it had a touchscreen but it did have next/previous buttons which was good enough for the task.
At my workplace we have a large LCD TV (about 60 inches?) mounted on the wall at IT. It uses Perl/CGI to query the support database and display a list of active support tickets and who they are assigned to, in large, bold font. Great motivation.
A projector? I have some LED sign displays as another commentor suggests, although they are a bit big, power hungry and bright to leave on 24/7 for reminders.
How about some photochromic paint, and a scanning laser? http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=UoUU7KEgdoc
Yeah, I've been dreaming about too for some time. It's one of my motivations to learn information design - in hope that one day I'll put a big dashboard on the wall that will update TODOs and graph data I want to track and get feedback on (like my spendings).
Yeah, a large wall-mounted e-ink screen would be awesome. I'm curious as to why we haven't seen any of these hot on the heels of kindle, etc.
It doesn't work. I have a 2m x 1m whiteboard in my room that sometimes gets littered with reminders about stuff. I've quickly learned to ignore it completely. I often end up rewriting those reminders closer together in a corner, when I need to free up some whiteboard space to do self-brainstorming or design something.
Even a whiteboard can be ignored. In fact, anything can be ignored if you're lazy. This tool seems to at least do something different such as watching your progress add up, but at the end of the day it's really up to you to do the task :)